Sailed, swum, scraped

Wednesday 15th April

Early Wednesday 15th at 0740 I farewelled Opua for a mini-cruise down the coast, destination Whangamumu. Motoring past Webb on Gannet (his photo on the right) I headed north.  The promised SW was building so it wasn't a day to stretch too far.  The backside  of Moturua was my goal.

A nice reach out toward Cape Wiki Wiki and then in to the narrow entrance to Waiwhapuku (Army) Bay. A couple of cruise party boats were in the main bay so I kept on going to Otupohu bay - an idyllic setting with only room for one or two vessels in the narrow mouth.














































Rowed ashore to explore and found a grassy park-like domain, complete with fancy composting toilet, tank and even the kitchen sink plumbed in! Marvelous spot for camping.  The composting toilet was an engineering marvel - and no smell!

 I seemed like that Kalai had been for the best part of this past week a 'work in progress,' with lots of little jobs and maintenance - much like the way we often see ourselves!  Today was no exception as I felt that she was a little sluggish and slow under motor particularly and may have some passengers.

So I checked the water temp - a balmy 17.4 deg and decided it was most definitely wetsuit territory.  Armed with long handled brush, scraper, mask and flippers I set about remedying the underwater situation.


Sure enough there were oysters, coral and barnacles hitching rides on the hull and shaft/prop. So, with the ubiquitous seabird watching on I cleared the freeloaders with an exhausting series of breath-holding dives below, Disappointing especially to find hard growth on the prop shaft and prop itself - it seems like the 'magic' prop-speed coating had failed in the re-application last year.

At least Sal the Seagull appeared to enjoy the performance - or maybe it was a smirk at the welcome warm shower after some severe gyrations removing the winter weight  4/3 mm wetsuit that had appeared to have shrunk over recent years... maybe I've lost some flexibility necessary to adroitly manage the removal of the aforementioned abomination of tightness?



This final shot is one of the vistas from this part of the BoI (looking due north)- and one of the reasons "I love this place!"